Key of Knowledge

SR No.: 006702
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Champat Rai Jain
Publisher: ZZZ Unknown
Publication Year: 1919
Total Pages: 1204
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 25 MB

Page 108

CREATION
87
But wbile it is true that experience never teaches us why things should exist as they do and not otherwise, understanding only finds its experiences to be governed by certain well-defined rules or laws. It follows that reflection makes good the shortcomings of experience, and must, therefore, be presumed to be endowed with the code of laws itself. In this sense the laws of understanding must be said to be given à priori. But, since our experiences of things only arise from contact with the things themselves, and since these experiences tally in all cases and without exception with the laws of understanding, it follows that things in nature are also subject to the same or to a corresponding set of laws. Hence, it is impossible that the validity of the laws of nature should ever be impaired.
The legitimate conclusion from all this is that the laws of nature are determined, and their validity and uniformity guaranteed and secured, by the very nature of substances of which mind and matter are the two most important. For practical purposes of life, it makes no difference to us whether matter be real or imaginary ; so long as our consciousness remains in touch with the universe, its imaginary surroundings, assuming it to be imaginary, would possess as much practical necessity and validity for us as they would have done had matter been endowed with real existence.
The next important question which arises in this connection is : who is the real knower ? The man in the street says, I, so and so, let us say, John Smith, am the kpower. Is it really so ? Does Mr. John Smith really know anything by himself ? Or does he merely know